1.27.2013

Auhagen Building Kitbash; Part 1

Auhagen is a German company that makes some really inexpensive buildings and detail kits. I've had the Aughagen 14 464 "2 Wohnhauser" kit for a while I thought it would be a good candidate for background/facade building behind the new terminal.

The kit comes with the two building sections already assembled, so some cutting was in order.

I wanted to take advantage of the balconies, but given that these are facades that need to be fairly shallow, I went with an approach that will stagger the walls with the balconies back from ther street.

This building is meant to be a fairly boring apartment building, but I wanted a bit of color as well, so I painted the balconies some alternate colors of blue and green to capture some of the look of what have seemed cool back in the late 1950's or 1960's when this building would have theoretically been designed. The building itself was painted in a Testor's 'Dark Aircraft Grey' and the window frames were painted with an "aluminum plate' color.

The ground floor sections provided with the kit didn't really work for me in the more commercial/urban environment this building would occupy, so I am scratch-building my own ground floor area using clear acrylic sheeting.

The next step in this project is to add the glazing (window plastic), block out some windows and add 'drapes', add lighting, and complete the exterior and interior commercial facades on the ground floor. Finally, I will probably add some lighting and signs to the roof top as well.

3 comments:

I picked up this exactly set when I was in the Czech republic, along with a "hospital" set which was essentially identical but bigger and with some different details. They are wonderful for bashing, my only problem with them is they have VERY low ceilings. Put a figure on a balcony and they nearly hit their head on the next story, I'd say it would be like 7' ceilings maximum.

I SO wanted to put those kits on my layout, but I ran out of room. They are IDENTICAL to the U.S military housing stairwell apartments that we are currently assigned over here in Germany. Right on with the dating of them ( built during the beginning of The Cold War era on the US installations.)

Thanks Baron and Michelle! Yes, they are pretty generic, so hopefully my bashing on them will have a little sense of realism to it! Baron, your comment raised a potential issue when I set it next to some of my other buildings - its floors will seem obviously shorter! Oh well, this is actually a common enough feature on my layout, but it'll be interesting to see how it turns out!

About Me

I'm into N Scale to have fun. Growing up my Dad was really big into HO (U.S.A. of course, mostly Western U.S. roads like Great Northern, Milwaukee Road, Northern Pacific, etc...) and he built me a small N Scale layout which I enjoyed as a small boy. Of the various trains I had at the time, the brand 'Minitrix' stuck in my head. As the years passed, N Scale was forgotten as new interests took my time.
As a new parent, I got back into model trains through O Gauge (Lionel and MTH). However, the cost of this scale, and the space needed for the sort of layout I wanted, made it a very frustrating hobby. Then one day at a hobby shop in California, I came across the Trix 2003 catalog; Inside this catalog were beautiful models of trains across Europe shown on beautiful layouts - and I was converted! It took a few years, but most of the O Gauge was sold (or stored) and I used the funds to start my new fantasy in N Scale.
Soon, I also discovered the amazing trains of Japan in N Scale, and begin my quest to build an interesting urban layout in a complete fantasy setting where the great trains of the world can run side by side!